Digital Trends

We are in the final countdown to this year's Consumer Electronics Show, one of the largest trade shows in the world. Here are a few products that look to be hot at the show. We will be writing more about them as they are announced next week.

Automotive Electronics

This is where you go to see really crazy stuff. Traditionally in this part of the show they have cars that are rolling showcases of audio and video technology. In past years I’ve seen 4x4s with flat panel displays on the axils and in the wheels, cars where the engines have been removed and replaced with amplifiers, and things that looked like they once were cars but now look like some sort of mutated Transformer. While there are some truly hot cars in this part of the show, 0-60 performance isn’t what they are showcasing. 

This year it is all about getting video and audio into the car, and expect to see a lot of wireless technology and iPod connectivity solutions featured. Displays have become really inexpensive, so video will be a big deal as will making cell phones work seamlessly with the whole mess. This is where GPS systems are showcased and the new thing this year are systems like the Dash which will actually report back their position and sometimes report back local traffic conditions in a peer-to-peer fashion. 

TVs

LED backlighting and wireless connectivity are already turning out to be the most interesting aspects so far. Yes the TVs will be getting bigger, and yes they will be getting less expensive, but LED backlighting makes them last up to 3 times longer, increases screen brightness, and dramatically reduces the power consumption of the set. But if you’ve ever hooked up a flat screen display, you know that wiring is a huge pain and removing that pain should be a big product differentiator. Using either proprietary or ultra-wideband connections, the featured wireless TVs or wireless adapters will make installing one of these sets vastly easier. 

The buzz on content includes downloads, and coming into the show there have been a number of announcements and leaks indicating that set top boxes are going to get a big push. I’m kind of surprised at the number of vendors who are doing this and you’ll see some manufacturers you never really expected, to be playing here. It is interesting to note that while Apple TV is often positioned as a failure, last year it was considered by many to be the best in its class, suggesting there is a massive need for improvement. It will be all about content and user experience, in that order, and while the vendors can fix the UI, content has remained elusive. 

We are probably coming into the last year for Plasma displays and the first for OLED based products. These new displays are paper thin and wild to look at. Plasma is being driven out by LCD technology and OLEDs will probably remain too expensive for most of us this year (more of a 2010 technology) but you can still see the products, and if you are willing to pay a lot to get an OLED set early (I’d recommend waiting) you’ll see what you can buy this year at the show.

PCs and Home Servers 

This is THE show where you see Media Center PCs, and there are a number of really cool looking ones with built in small displays this year. I’ve never found the usability where it needs to be in this class of product but I’m being told that it is vastly better this year. Microsoft is rumored to be doing an enhancement to Media Center later in the year which may help this product class dramatically. One of the big stories is that Lenovo is using this show as their opportunity to move on the US consumer market and you’ll see a few of their new products; they are actually surprisingly attractive and should be as reliable as a ThinkPad (which Lenovo also makes). They make unique use of lighting and finishes, so expect to see others do the same with their new lines. 

It seems that folks are doing more with the outside of the box than the inside, but you’ll see a number of systems that have solid state drives, built in HD drives, and led backlit displays, suggesting the insides are changed as well. Net benefits are lighter units, better battery life, and more attractive personalized designs; all of which should make shopping for the back-to-school season in few months much more interesting this year. 

Dell is doing this gorgeous crystal monitor which needs to be seen to be believed, and the new laptops from Lenovo called IdeaPad (I particularly like the Y710) are impressive efforts.

Other Consumer Electronics 

You’ll see a lot of iPod and iPhone accessories (clearly a lot of these vendors don’t know that CES competes with MacWorld) and I’m clearly understating this. But you’ll also see a lot of accessories which work with other MP3 players and cell phones as well. These things range from devices that tie your stuff into your car or home audio system to pica projectors which allow you to do a presentation from your phone using a pocket “Pico” projector. 

This projector is rather cool. Think about of being able to take your iPod and projecting your TV show or YouTube video on your room wall. It’s about the size of, well, and iPod. 

Three concepts to look for: green because the environment is a major player at this year’s CES, small because size does matter (even the hot OLED TVs are small), wireless because if god had wanted us to always have to plug in he wouldn’t have allowed WiFi to be invented, and beautiful designs because, well, Steve Jobs was right and tech doesn’t have to be ugly.

Later we’ll talk about what I actually saw at the show and next week, assuming I can remember anything.